


Bloodstains

by Erdariel



Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: A LOT of Angst, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon-Typical Violence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Guilt, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Savoy, Pre-Canon, Violence, Yeah I'm being my own evil self again, more or less
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-09
Updated: 2019-11-09
Packaged: 2021-01-26 09:09:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,975
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21371671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Erdariel/pseuds/Erdariel
Summary: When Aramis is wounded in battle, Treville realizes the scars left in him by Savoy aren't quite as healed as Treville had thought them to be. The fight to save Aramis's life reawakens the guilt he has tried to ignore for months.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 44





	Bloodstains

**Author's Note:**

> I took a bit of time off from writing Blood, Shadow, Silver to do some Musketeers stuff for a change. (Hey, I've got done three chapters and am halfway through writing the fourth for it, it's not like I'd be procrastinating writing it at all!) I mean, I started this months ago, but it was left half-finished then and I'd nearly forgotten this. 
> 
> I don't know why I like exploring Treville's feelings and thoughts about the Savoy-thing so much, but well, since I like it, I'm gonna write it, do I need any justification for liking it?
> 
> Mademoisellesnowflake, finishing and posting this is my revenge for what you did to Aramis in your most recent fic >:D

Treville and Aramis had set out on the road early in the morning, and knew that around sunset they should reach the small town (it was more like a village in size, but two bigger roads crossed there, so there was a good inn) they were planning to spend the night in. They were returning to Paris alone; Treville, with Aramis and several other Musketeers, had been escorting a nobleman from Paris back to his lands in northeast France, but Treville had had some business of his own in the same area, and had decided to get it done in person since he was there. He'd sent most of the troop ahead to Paris, but had asked Aramis to stay with him. It was mostly because he liked company, but in part also because if trouble did arise, it was easier to handle it when there were two people than it would be alone. Now they were on their way back to Paris, too, about three days behind the others. It was mid-August, and the weather had been warm and sunny for the past few days.

"It's going to rain", Aramis observed sometime in the afternoon. 

Treville glanced at him over his shoulder, and then to their right. Aramis was correct: dark blue and gray and nearly black clouds filled half the sky, and unless the wind's current direction changed dramatically, the clouds would soon be above them. And with the clouds' colour, it would be no light rain either, but a proper thunderstorm.

"Damn", Treville muttered. "I was hoping for a good riding weather for the whole day."

"Certainly looked like we were getting it this morning. Not so much now, though", Aramis replied.

Treville nodded. "Well, can't be helped. There's nowhere we can reach in time to get shelter. We'll just have to live with it."

Not long afterwards the rain came down on them. First it was a few drops every now and then, but it soon grew into a hard downpour. Lightning flash brightened the sky for a moment, then disappeared, followed by a roar of thunder. Treville thanked his luck that their horses were calm-natured. The last thing they'd need would be for the thunder to frighten them.

The rain soaked through their clothes. The road under the horses' hooves turned to mud. Treville's mind wandered, and when he did for a moment concentrate on what was actually going on, it was only to wish that they'd reach the next town soon.

That was, as it turned out, a mistake. A gunshot rang out, waking both Treville and Aramis from their thoughts. The road ahead seemed still clear, so they urged their horses into a gallop, hoping to outrun... whoever the shooter was.

The road made a curve there, disappearing behind a hill. They rounded the curve only to find the road blocked there. It wasn't very solid a barrier, constructed mostly of fallen branches piled on top of each other, but it was high enough that a horse couldn't easily jump it, and solid-looking enough that a horse shied from it. Behind it stood two men, one of them holding a carbine.

Treville swore. It wasn't the first time Aramis had heard him swearing, but he'd never heard quite so colourful choice of words from him. Or quite so many such words at once. 

They turned around to see five more men closing the road behind them. They were all dressed in worn clothes. Two of them had guns, though theirs were pistols instead of carbines. The rest were holding... well, they were farm tools, but these men were holding them like weapons. And scythes and pitchforks were essentially a sharp pieces of iron at the end of heavy wooden sticks. In the hands of a skilled wielder, they were just as deadly as any sword or pike. Many others would have laughed at these bandits, but Treville wasn't going to underestimate them. They were likely commoners, born and raised in farms. They wouldn't have known how to use a sword, but they certainly did know how to use a scythe.

Treville and Aramis dismounted. This wasn't going to be a fight where being mounted would give any advantage. They both pulled their pistols, and positioned themselves back-to-back.

The bandits shooed the horses away. Obviously they thought the horses wouldn't go too far away here in the forest, and with this they could ensure that no harm came to them.

The two bandits who had been waiting behind the barrier pushed their way through it. Unlike any of the others, the one who had a carbine also carried a sword. The other one was armed with a scythe. From the attitude of the men, it was clear that the one with the carbine and the sword was the leader.

"Good evening, gentlemen", the sword-wielder said, a mocking smile playing on his lips. "I offer you two options. We will take what we want from you, and leave you to continue your journey with what we don't want. Or, we will kill you and take all you have. Choose wisely, and don't make this hard for us - or yourselves."

Treville frowned, quietly considering their options. Two trained soldiers from the king's own regiment, against a seven farmers-turned-bandits? There was a chance they'd win against the bandits, and it wasn't impossibly high. On the other hand, the bandits probably weren't ready sacrifice more than one or two of their own at best for the loot. Probably. And they _probably_ weren't _that_ good at killing people, even though they were mostly armed with tools they could use, rather than weapons they couldn't. Assuming they hadn't been bandits for long. If they had, that was another thing. All Treville could do was make a guess about their skill and willingness to fight and trust his and Aramis's life on that guess.

Then again, they could always let the bandits take what they were after, and then come back later with a bigger troop to catch or kill the whole group of bandits, and recover their lost valuables in the process. They weren't carrying any urgent or secret messages, or anything else they really couldn't afford to lose. But the bandits were almost certainly going to take their horses, and Treville wasn't eager to walk to the next town in this weather. He wasn't sure his authority as the captain of the Musketeers would be enough to get them new horses if they didn't have any money to pay for it, either. That would mean returning back to Paris on foot, and Treville _really_ didn't fancy spending the rest of eternity being mocked by Cardinal Richelieu about losing his money, horse, and just about everything else to some ordinary bandits. And the King would probably find it quite amusing, too, and once he laughed, so would the rest of the court...

"Are you going to choose, or will I make the choice for you?" the bandit leader demanded.

"Aramis, do you feel up to a fight?" Treville asked quietly.

Aramis didn't say anything, but nodded grimly. Treville turned back to the bandit leader.

"I warn you, we are soldiers. This is not a fight you want", he told them.

"We'll see about that", the bandit leader answered, raising his gun.

He died before he could fire, Treville's bullet buried in his brain. For a moment the bandits stood frozen, not used to their victims being the ones to take the initiative. Treville used that moment to put away his pistol and draw his sword, while Aramis shot one of the two other bandits with guns.

Then the fight began, and Treville learned how very right he had been about farm tools being just as deadly as weapons made for war. It took skill, effort, and luck to evade the sharp metal parts of them to get close enough that the sword was any use in the first place. Then it took some more effort to evade the heavy wooden shaft of the tool when the bandits attempted to hit him with that.

A gunshot and a cry of pain made Treville whirl around. He saw Aramis on his knees in the mud, though from where he stood he couldn't see where Aramis had been hit. He could see, however, the look of horror on Aramis's face. That, and the glazed eyes staring unseeing into the distance, made it evident that Aramis no longer knew where he was or what was truly happening. Treville knew what it was that Aramis was seeing, and knew that in the state he was now, Aramis was unable to defend himself.

He forced down a flash of guilt. He hadn't the time to think about it now. Both their lives depended on his skill and strength now. He rushed toward Aramis, but saw he couldn't reach him first. One of the bandits was closer, and he grabbed Aramis and placed a knife on his throat.

Treville stopped for one brief moment. A thousand thoughts raced through his mind. The one that ended up on the top was: if he slits Aramis's throat, he'll lose all the protection he has, so he won't do it. Even if he does, they were going to kill us anyway, so why should I make that any easier for them?

He noticed that the corpse at his feet belonged to the group's leader. The man hadn't fired his carbine, so if it hadn't gotten too wet lying there in the mud... He picked the gun up. He wasn't going to shoot the man who had taken Aramis. Even from this short a distance it was too risky. But there were two others still remaining, so faster than thought, he aimed and fired, and one went down.

He picked up his sword again, and headed for the last one who wasn't holding Aramis hostage. That man posed more of a threat, since he wasn't hindered by trying to keep himself behind Aramis and his knife on Aramis's throat. He had to be taken care of first.

As always when he fought, Treville's world shrunk to contain only his opponent, the ground around them, and what his senses told him that could be of use during the fight. There was no past, and no future more than a strike or two ahead was worth planning, because there was no way of predicting much more than the next strike if even that. There was only Treville himself, and his opponent, and his sword against the bandit's scythe. There was the mud that sucked on their feet and hindered their moves, and the corpses littering the ground on the edge of their small world. Nothing beyond that was immediate enough to matter.

Treville felt a sharper pain in his left arm for a moment, but then it dulled and faded into the background with all the other cuts and bruises he'd gotten during the battle. He forced his way closer, past the scythe-blade that cut a wound into his leg and another to his side. He saw fear fill the bandit's eyes. The man knew he was doomed long before Treville's sword found his eye and sunk into his brain.

As the man fell, Treville heard Aramis cry in pain. It wasn't the repulsive, gurgling sound he'd have made if his throat had been slit, but the cry still made Treville fear the worst. He turned around, and in his eyes danced white-hot flames of anger bordering on madness. He moved just as carefully as before, still keeping himself under control, but one glance to his eyes made it clear that he wasn't far from going berserk.

The bandit hadn't cut Aramis's throat. Instead, he had made a long, diagonal cut across his chest. It was impossible to tell how deep it was, but it was bleeding a lot. The bandit had clearly meant it as a proof that his threat was serious, but to Treville, at least to the part of him that still thought instead of only reacting, it only proved that the man was a fool. Running away with Aramis between Treville and himself was the only way the man had any hope to survive. It was hard enough to escape with an unwilling hostage through an uneven terrain like the forest around the road. It was twice as hard to do so with a badly wounded one.

Then again, it seemed the man had no intention to run at all. He only stood there, his knife on Aramis's throat, staring at Treville. He seemed to have realized that killing Aramis would gain him nothing and leave him without any protection against Treville, but he hadn't yet understood that he was supposed to run.

As Treville killed that final bandit, part of him almost pitied the lot of them. Had they asked for it, or had they even just turned and ran, he might have given them mercy. They wouldn't really have been worth his time. Besides, it was late and all he wanted in this miserable weather was to get to the next town and into a comfortable, warm, and dry inn. But the moment one of them had tried capturing Aramis, their fates had been sealed.

"Captain", Aramis muttered as Treville sheathed his sword and dropped to his knees beside him.

Treville didn't say anything, but concentrated on trying to get Aramis's blood-soaked leather doublet open and doing something about his wounds. It wasn't a pretty sight. Alongside the cut across his chest, Aramis had a gunshot wound in his shoulder. Both were bleeding a lot, and Treville wondered if he could staunch the bleeding enough to keep Aramis alive until the next village.

He reached for the dead bandit, and began ripping his shirt apart for bandages. There probably would have been clean cloth meant for bandages somewhere in Aramis's bags - ever since Savoy Aramis had been trying to learn every piece of field medics' knowledge, and carried medical supplies with him on missions - but Treville didn't want to lose precious time looking for them now.

"Captain!" Aramis said. There was panic in his voice. "You're bleeding."

Treville glanced down at the wound in his arm. "It's fine, Aramis. Don't worry about me, I'll do something about it when we get to the next village. You're hurt much worse."

He saw Aramis wasn't listening, but he didn't have time to do anything about his own wounds now, not even to comfort Aramis. If it would even be enough to calm him down anymore anyway. There was a haunted look in Aramis's eyes, and Treville wasn't quite sure if it was rain and mud Aramis was seeing, or snow.

"Captain!" Aramis repeated desperately.

"I'm fine, Aramis", Treville said sternly.

To his relief, the horses hadn't gone very far. He got them back to the road and pushed aside the piles of branches blocking it.

"Aramis, can you come here? We need to go", he said.

Aramis tried to get up. He succeeded on the third try and took a few faltering steps before collapsing.

Treville went to Aramis and helped him up. Aramis was only half-conscious anymore. If they wouldn't reach the next town soon, and if there wasn't someone more skilled at treating wounds than Treville was, Aramis probably wouldn't live to see the next morning.

Treville threw Aramis on the back of a horse and mounted the same horse himself. He didn't think Aramis could keep himself in the saddle in the state he was in. 

The ride to the next village was a race against time. Sun went down before they were halfway there, and Treville rode on in darkness. The cold rain beat his face, each drop feeling as sharp as a needle. The wind howled, and it was impossible to hear anything but it and the pounding of the horses' hooves on the road. It was probably a good thing; Treville didn't particularly want to hear Aramis whimpering in pain.

As they rode, Treville wondered what it was that had woken up the ghosts Aramis carried. He had been getting stronger, and at least if what Porthos had told him was right, Aramis hadn't even had nightmares since the snows had melted and weather gotten warmer. Treville had judged him fit for duty again in early summer, and in the two months since then there had been no problems. He'd thought Aramis was alright again, that things had gone back to the way they had been before.

On the other hand, come to think of it, most of that time Aramis had been in palace guard, not on missions out of Paris. And this was the first time he'd gotten into a fight since what had happened in Savoy, and the first time he'd gotten wounded...

I should have guessed this, Treville thought grimly. And it's my fault, all of it. I ordered him to stay behind instead of going ahead with the rest of my men, simply because I wanted to have someone to talk to on the journey back. It's my fault he froze when he was wounded, too. If I hadn't obeyed my orders, he would have returned from Savoy the soldier he always was before, and not haunted by ghosts of all the men I got killed. He would have kept fighting, he wouldn't have gotten wounded worse. If he dies, his blood too will be on my hands, as surely as if I'd lost him at Savoy.

The last thought made him feel as cold on the inside as the rain was making him feel on the outside, and yet it burned hot, branding itself into his mind. Part of him cried that he'd only been following orders, that this wasn't his fault, that there were many variables completely out of his control that were as much to blame for this as his decisions, but it couldn't convince the rest of him. Besides, even if this situation hadn't been completely his fault, he still had the blood of too many of his men on his hands. It was already too much, and he couldn't wash his hands off of it, no matter how hard he tried. He couldn't clean his conscience, or his memory, of all that blood. Of all those _deaths_. He wasn't sure how he could bear the guilt if even a drop more stained him. And if that blood would be Aramis's...

Treville shoved the thought angrily aside, but the feeling of guilt wouldn't leave. It was his eternal companion, had been ever since Savoy, but usually he could ignore it. Not so much now. He urged the horse onward, trying to get it to go a little faster, as if a few minutes would make a difference.

It was near midnight when they got into the town they'd been heading to. Treville found the inn. He got the horses inside the stable, and into stalls, but didn't take their saddles or saddlebags off. He could come and do it later. All that mattered right now was Aramis. By now the poor man was totally unconscious, and didn't stir when Treville got him down from the horse's back and carried him to the inn.

Everyone in the inn's common room turned to look at Treville when he came in. He stood in place for a moment, trying to read the atmosphere of the room. Silence fell as more and more people noticed him and forgot their conversations.

"Is there anyone here who can treat wounds?" Treville asked before anyone else could break the silence. He glanced at Aramis. "He needs help."

At first he got nothing but silent stares. Then a young man rose to his feet.

"There's no trained physician here, sir, but there's the old midwife that everyone goes to when someone's ill or hurt", the young man said.

Treville had his doubts about how much good that would be, but at this point it probably wasn't going to do any harm, either. And he wasn't going to refuse help when it was offered.

"Go get her then, and quickly", he ordered.

He carried Aramis inside and laid him on a bench by the fireplace. Even in the warm glow of the fire Aramis seemed pale, and his face was twisted with pain. Treville turned his gaze away, hoping that the guilt he felt didn't show on his face.

"I'll go get our bags, I left them in the stables. We can sort out the payment once I return", Treville said to the innkeeper.

Once Treville had paid for the night, people began asking what had happened. Treville shrugged, told in as few words as possible that they had been attacked by bandits on the road, and then ignored any further questions about the matter.

He carried Aramis upstairs to the room he'd gotten them for the night, holding him as gently as if he had been a small child. He had just laid Aramis on the bed when the woman the young man had gone to get arrived. The young man himself was standing near the door, watching, as if waiting for orders. The woman nodded shortly to Treville, then turned to the young man and told him to go get some warm, clean water. The boy was off like a bullet; it clearly wasn't his first time helping her.

Treville showed the woman the bag where Aramis kept his medical supplies. She thanked him, looked through the bag, and turned his attention back to Aramis.

The whole time the woman worked on Aramis's wounds, her lips pressed tightly together and her brow furrowed in a concentrated frown, Treville stayed back. He watched her work in silence that was only deepened by the vague noise coming from the common room downstairs. His feeling of guilt only deepened as he understood how utterly useless he was at the moment, how helpless to do anything to save Aramis. He noticed his hands were still covered in blood. Some was his, but most of it was Aramis's. It was almost completely dried now, cracking and flaking off when he moved his fingers. Only in a few spots the blood was still sticky and not yet dry. He stared at it, absently wondering if he should go wash it off his hands.

Aramis's blood on my hands... he shook his head to get rid of the thought, but it wouldn't leave. He's not dead, and yet– and yet his blood stains my hands. Just like the blood of all who did die does.

It was impossible to tell how much time exactly had passed, but the candle on the table was considerably shorter when the woman was finished treating Aramis. She was reluctant to accept payment for her help, but Treville insisted on it – he had no other way to reward her help, to show his own gratefulness, and it still felt like too little for saving a life. He declined politely from her offer to take a look at his wounds, too, saying he was satisfied with his own skills when it came to them and didn't want to bother her any longer.

The woman left, and Treville was left alone with Aramis. Aramis was still unconscious, and the flickering candlelight cast ghostly shadows on his pale face. Treville stayed awake, watching over him. It was late, but he couldn't sleep. He couldn't leave Aramis without knowing someone was watching over him, not when he was wounded like that, half-dead. And the only one there to do so was himself.

So he sat there, alone with his own thoughts. The night passed and the candle burned lower, and Treville kept watch and hoped things would turn out alright for Aramis.

**Author's Note:**

> If you have anything at all to say, I'd love to hear it! I live for comments <3


End file.
